Large Scale Central

evilBay question

Being a babe in the woods I’m hoping one of you more “experienced” fellows can explain.

Saw something on eBay…placed bid $5 more than current bid…instantly I was outbid by $5…hmmmm…place another bid $5 higher…instantly outbid by $5 again…hmmmmm
Makes me think there’s some kind of auto bidding program running.
What say you dear fellows .

Yes, eBay has auto-bid. You bid the maximum you want to spend and the system will keep increasing your bid as needed to stay in the lead. Personally I don’t think that system works very well, I’ve never been able to win something I want using auto-bid. My only successes have been to sit on an item until the very last seconds of the auction and then place my bid. The method requires a good clock that is synced to eBay and a fast connection. Some people dislike the practice but it is within the eBay rules.

Someone has a higher bid on it than you want to bid and ebay bids it up in increments until you beat his bid.
Make a bid in the amount you want to pay for the item and walk away.
And there are sites that do the bidding for you.

The last 30 seconds are when it gets real hairy !
Good luck
:wink:

So in this example, lettuce say, you see something you wish to bid on, and it is sitting at $50, and shows one other bidder.

So you enter a bid of $50 or more. BUT, the other bidder entered a proxy of $100.

So you will always be outbid by whatever amt set for that range until you get over their $100.

This is why David says to wait until the last 30 seconds.

I do understand…Thanks :slight_smile: The item is now over what I think it’s worth…might as well buy one new…maybe :wink:

Yes Larry, one thing to watch.

Of course, eleven years ago on eBay when I was selling automobile factory repair manuals I had from a pervious career life, it was nice when people would bid more than new for shopworn copies!

Larry, one other very important thing, decide how much you are going to spend and stick to it! You can get in to a bidding war trying to out bid someone else and pay way too much for a simple item! So plan ahead and then stick to it. Let the other guy pay too much!

Paul

E. Paul Austin said:
Larry, one other very important thing, decide how much you are going to spend and stick to it! You can get in to a bidding war trying to out bid someone else and pay way too much for a simple item! So plan ahead and then stick to it. Let the other guy pay too much!

Paul


I agree. When I see something I want, I decide the max price I’m willing to pay, and put that in. If I eventually get outbid, oh well.

On the items I did get for way below retail, the item was pulled at the last minute. EvilBay is a good title.

patience is most important with ebay.
there are very few items, where one must say “it’s now or never”.
most things will be offered again.

today i did not win on three stainz locos. but all three of them sold higher, than i thought, what they are worth.
wendsday there are concluding two more auctions on stainzes. maybe i’ll get one of those. - if not, there will be more in the future.
.

A pox on their houses.
Evil Bay & PayPal.

I simply don’t get how you “Win” something by paying for it. If you pay for something you have “bought” it, not won it.

He he he Korm,

Patience in the instant gratification era? He he he!
The modern consumer’s prayer: “Please Lord, give me patience. Right NOW!”
Today I’m slightly more cynical than usual, observing humanity in action at a local exhibition will do that.

Oh BTW I was after a green RhB Ge 4/4" and I was patiently waiting … a full SIX years until I got it at the price I figured it was worth. Yep and that was on evilBay, too. :wink: :slight_smile:

6 years…oh my :slight_smile: Patience like that, have not I

Anybody besides me noticed now even Evil Bay things are going higher and higher more than you could buy somewhere retail. But of course not when I sell I just had a couple things on there going at the SAME price as others have sold theirs for and had a lot of viewers and or views of the ad but NO bids. Me thinks its time to sway away from Evil Bay!! Once in awhile you could get a deal but not anymore. I’ve seen things go higher than retail. I think some of these guys who do store fronts on there or are high auction sales, have buddies (shill bidders) bid their items up so they don’t loose any money on em. One in particular on a certain item they always get the same amt. before its sold??? Go figure and that’s pretty much every time never lower same price or higher. And they usually stay $2 under what lowest retailer sells for. Go figure sumtin up!! Regal

Exaxtly, wait for days, months, years…depending on what it is, you can get deals.

Or the other odd ball, I was trying to buy an out of print railroad book about ten years ago. Commonly going for over $150…eventually after watching this go on for well over a month, then one week day, during an off hour I got a copy of the same book for about $60. Then a week later, they were all high again.

The secret to eBay is when two or more people want something, it does not work with just one.

And sometimes it is silly, for example, a little while ago a battery Rigi set, used, taterd box, missing stuff, went for over $360, while one of the good 120V powered dealer ones went for $120?!?!?!?!?!?

You all have just about covered the possible experiences with EBay. Personally, I love it. I have been buying and selling things there for ten years. The best advice I can give is know what something is worth. and don’t pay more. I have gotten some killer deals on engines over the years. Just don’t get caught up in the moment of raising the bid. The one thing I have noticed that is disturbing to me is the price people are charging for shipping is going up now to some very unreasonable amounts. I now watch the shipping costs as much as I watch the cost of an item I want to buy.
Otherwise I think it still is a safe way to buy stuff you can’t find just anywhere. Good luck.

Auction Sniper is what I use. I decide on the max that I am willing to pay for an item and let Auction Sniper do all the work. It makes the bids by computer and can do it faster than one can sitting at the keyboard and mouse. Most bids as said are won in the last few seconds and Auction Sniper can get a bid in at the very last instance.

http://auctionsniper.com/

How much do they cost?

David Hill said:
On the items I did get for way below retail, the item was pulled at the last minute. EvilBay is a good title.
Thats interesting, how long ago was this? I know when I sell on Feebay part of the rules are that within 12 hours of the closing time, you can only pull an item out of auction if there are no bids on it, if there are any bids, even just one, Feebays locks the seller out from being able to do something like pulling it off auction just becuase the seller thinks it will sell for less than they want for it, like you describe. As a seller its also important to set your initial offering price at the absolute lowest your willing to sell it for. If a seller is baiting an item with a uber-low starting bid then pulling it off even after bids are placed they are doing something fishy and should be reported to the Feebay police.